Dashboard

The Murl Engine Dashboard is a tool to simplify the process of creating and maintaining project files across different platforms and provides some further helpful functions.

Prerequisites and Installation

The Dashboard is a cross platform application written in Java. A installed Java runtime environment version 1.6 or higher is required in order to use the application.

The program is provided with the Murl Engine. A separate installation is not necessary. All files can be found in the directory Dashboard.app.

Start of Program

Mac OS X
The application can be started by double clicking the file Dashboard.

Windows
The application can be started by double clicking the file dashboard.jar in the directory Dashboard.app.
Alternatively: Double click the file dashboard.exe or run: java –jar dashboard.jar

Graphical User Interface

Dashboard graphical user interface.

The graphical user interface is basically built up from one menu and a toolbar to start commands plus a log area to display the command messages.

ACTIVE PROJECT

Display the currently active (opened) project.

LOG OUTPUT

Display the log messages of the individual commands.

LOG CONTROL BUTTONS

Terminate Process
Stop the currently running command.

Clear Console
Clear the content of the log area.

Copy to Clipboard
Copy the selected lines of the log area to the system clipboard.

Settings

The application requires at least a path to the installation directory of the Murl Engine. In most cases the default setting of ".." as a relative path is sufficient. The Murl Engine directory setting needs to be adapted if a different installation of the Murl Engine should be used or if the Dashboard application has been moved to another location.

Dashboard settings example.

The path settings for the Android™ SDK, the Android™ NDK, Ant, Android Studio and an installed JDK needs to be set in order to use Android™ related commands e.g.

TOOLBAR / MENU

Frequently used commands can be started by using the toolbar or optionally by the menu.

Create Project
Create a new empty project (based on a template project).

Open Project
Open an existing project in the Dashboard application.

Update Project
Update all project files of the currently active project. All existing source files will be added to the individual project files (xCode, Visual Studio etc.) and not existing files will be removed from the project files.

Xcode/VisualStudio
Open the current project in the preferred IDE. The arrow button next to the icon can be used to choose the desired project (for example Visual Studio 2010 or Visual Studio 2013 project; iOS or OSX project).

Android Build
Open the Android project in the IDE or start a Android build. The arrow button next to the icon can be used to choose the build system (e.g. Ant, Gradle, Android Studio).

Resource Packer
Start the resource packer for all *.murlres directories. The command is searching within the data directory.

Project / Resource Packer Clean
Delete all *.murlpkg files in the directory data. A possibly deleted startup.murlpkg where no appropriate startup.murlres directory exists will be restored from murl/common/data/packages/startup.murlpkg.

Android / Ant Build System / Debug/Release Build & Install & Run Start an Android™ debug build, install the APK on an attached Android™ device and run the App.

Android / Ant Build System / (Debug bzw. Release) / Clean
Remove the Android™ code that have been built previously.

Android / Ant Build System / Clean All
Remove the Android™ code that have been built previously for debug und release.

Android / Ant Build System / Build All
Create an Android™ APK from source code for release and for debug.

Android / Gradle Build System / Debug/Release Build & Install & Run
Start a new build, install the APK on an attached Android™ device and run the App. The product flavor depends on the CPU ABI parameter in the common Makefile.

Android / Gradle Build System / Build Debug/Release
Create an Android™ APK from source code. The product flavor depends on the CPU ABI parameter in the common Makefile.

Android / Gradle Build System / Install Debug/Release
Install the Android™ APK to an attached Android™ device. The product flavor depends on the CPU ABI parameter in the common Makefile.

Android / Gradle Build System / Clean Project
Remove the Android™ code that have been built previously.

Android / Configure Project
Configure Android™ project settings. All changes made in the dialog will be applied to the common Makefile.

Android / Open Project in Android Studio IDE
Open the current project in the Android Studio IDE.

Customize

SHELL SCRIPTS

Some commands simply call a shell script. The used shell scripts can be found in the sub directory Dashboard.app/data/scripts and can be adapted if necessary.

TEMPLATES

The project generation command is based on a template project. The template project can be found in the sub directory Dashboard.app/data/templates. New template projects can be added to the directory or the existing template project can be adapted if necessary.

Basically the create project command is copying the template project to the destination folder and then is replacing each appearance of Template by the project name:

TEMPLATE → PROJECT_NAMETemplate → ProjectName template → project_name

MISC

An empty text file named dashboard.ignore causes the Update Project command to ignore all files and subdirectories in this directory.